Something New

After about thirty years of monotonous death, passed under a rigid routine, she finally found a blend of permission and courage to go out alone. The elder who watched over her, the one responsible for her transformation, disapproved of such early independence, but he understood these were different times. Life moved too quickly in the 20th century. If she waited the 80 years tradition dictated, she would be just as lost and outdated as any elder. Besides, his fledgling was a careful one. He could trust her.

For a child among the dead, thirty years had already been cruel to her memories and affections. Wherever she went, nothing looked familiar, except for buildings that were now listed as heritage or simply abandoned. There was no trace of the places she used to love while alive. If she got lucky, a bar was still a bar, but with a different name, different crowd, different soundtrack. She didn't expect to see familiar faces and wasn't supposed to seek them, but at least the spirit of that time should live on somehow in a new generation of rebels. It wasn't as easy as she hoped.

Still, it felt good to wear combat boots and walk those old downtown streets again. Surrounded by the ghost-dreams of success in now-empty offices, among buildings older than she was, wrapped in a silence and melancholy that belonged out of time, a spirit older than the time of the dead. It was a strange mixture of delight in a city so beautiful and despair over the capitalist machine that chewed everything up and spat out broken scraps. Wealth and misery on every corner in a way that couldn't be ignored.

She wished she had her camera to capture the city's chiaroscuro, its textures. There was relief in no longer being part of that game. A dead body didn't fear hunger, cold, harm, or being mugged, sensations a woman alone could never escape in life. But beyond that relief, there was a biting nostalgia that night. She missed her dreams from when she was alive: a career, a long body of photographic work, a home, a group of comrades burning for revolution and change, hustling and pushing forward.

She had come to the capital to chase all that. Dying early cut everything at the root.

A little past midnight, the dead woman decided to head back toward the metro. She sat near the station's exit, watching the flow of people rushing home, catching the last train, or just arriving, thinking only of leaving again at sunrise. She pretended to sip a beer and waited. Soon, her people started appearing, and it brought some comfort to realize that some things hadn't changed: combat boots, black clothes, spikes. The bands on the shirts were new, but the spirit was the same. They walked in packs, laughing, debating music, film, soap operas, just as fluently as they spoke about politics.

Her dead heart ached. Those kids... they were so young.

She followed a group to a hidden garage on a side street clogged with people. The party had practically closed the street. Clusters of folks gathered, speaking loudly. A speaker blasted The Smiths. Street vendors sold drinks and snacks out of Styrofoam boxes and car trunks. She realized smoking wasn't allowed indoors any more, cigarette butts now littered the gutters.

Inside, the garage led down into a basement with a small stage. A guitar shrieked in a synthetic, cacophonic wail, and a drunk-sounding vocalist moaned over the noise. Packed in tight, the crowd swayed to the rhythm. When the chorus hit, everything got louder, rougher, angrier. The sweaty mass of people became a jumping wave. The pit exploded into a shoving frenzy, violence constrained to that space and pulse. She didn't know the song, but she already knew she'd fall in love with the rest of the set. She didn't sweat, but her clothes turned damp, and her cold body warmed in the crush of others. In no time, she was pressed against the barrier, screaming the chorus with everyone else, feeling the drums and bass vibrate through her entire frame.

But before the show ended, someone ran a hand across her back, slipping fingers into the slit of her dress where the lace exposed bare skin. The monster within her opened its eyes. She hadn't come to hunt, but the hunger surged, mean and urgent. In the dim lighting, a cruel confidence bloomed, she could grab that man, make him kneel, bite down and drink like he was a juice box, leave nothing behind but a crushed shell.

She fled before it became unbearable. Before the prey pushed her to the edge. She went to sit on the curb and let the night air wash the bloodlust from her senses.

That's when he approached. He crouched beside her, touched her shoulder with no hesitation or restraint.

"You need somewhere to calm down."

His voice was raspy and soft, it wasn't a question. His dark eyes were beautiful, set in a face too symmetrical, like it had been sculpted from dark clay. His smile was gentle, elegant, unlike all the others down there. There was something strange, inhuman about him, and she could only think of one explanation.

"Is this your territory?" she asked, her words slightly slurred, shock still running through her.

"Yeah. I keep the place running, and as safe as it gets."

"Sorry. I didn't know."

She pulled back from his touch, but he insisted.

"You couldn't have known, right?" he corrected.

His hand slid down her arm, his smile widening. His eyes were big, brown, with lazy lids that gave him the look of a satisfied cat, hiding every intention.

"I'll go, before I cause any trouble."

She offered. He declined:

"It's still early. I've got a calmer, comfier spot where you can stay until you feel better. What's your name?"

The voice of the one who made her echoed in her mind, stern: Run. Find a safe place. Call me. That would've been the sensible, safe thing to do, but she knew that if she followed those orders, she'd be taking steps backward in her independence. It was the perfect excuse the elder needed to trap her inside again for another decade.

"I'm Mônica. I... I can't stay long. I have a curfew."

The man smiled even wider.

"I'm Lírio. Don't worry, I'll give you back in one piece."

He took her hand. Despite his rough skin, his touch was warm, with a softness beneath the coarseness.

The house-turned-party-spot had a second floor, but it wasn't connected to the main one by any indoor stairs. Lírio excused himself to the group leaning against a small iron gate, unlocked it, and gently tugged Mônica along the tiled concrete steps. They climbed carefully, avoiding the little flower pots scattered along the way. Despite the music still thumping below, the brick walls already muffled most of the noise.

To Mônica, it felt like stepping through a fantasy film portal, traveling between realities. And when Lírio opened the door to the upstairs room, the contrast struck even harder.

Inside, it smelled of sweet incense. The lighting was soft, indirect. The furniture, in hues of grey and blue, had been chosen carefully to look accidental, artfully arranged, like a mistake that worked. Objects, fabrics, and handmade crafts filled every inch of the space in a way that was asymmetrical, tilted, intentional. Harmony in excess, not in restraint.

Heavy curtains sealed the windows, isolating the space from the outside chaos.

Lírio slipped off his sandals and left them by the door. Mônica followed, taking a moment to undo the laces of her boots. Then he draped himself across one of the couches like a lounging courtier, gesturing for her to curl up on the opposite seat.

She did. And just by being there, away from the heat, the sweat, the friction of other bodies, the hunger inside her finally quieted. The monster whined about the hunt cut short, but recognized there was something more pressing in that room. Something dangerous that demanded focus. Something it couldn't help her understand, only fight, if needed.

"Better now?" Lírio asked.

"Yes. Thank you," Mônica replied, a faint smile blooming on her red-painted lips.

Lírio didn't dress like anyone downstairs. His brocade blazer shimmered with warm browns and golds, far too refined for a party like that. His black jeans were clean, undecorated, not even torn.

And he let her take her time studying every detail, patiently allowing her gaze to linger.

"I really liked what you've done with the place," Mônica said, breaking the silence, out of politeness, but also instinct. It was what she did in any situation: guide the conversation, charm the client. "It felt good to find this. Reminded me of places I used to go. You know, before. A sweet little dose of nostalgia."

He nodded, calmly pleased in that way of his, like he always knew more than he let on.

"That's nice to hear," he said, voice like velvet. "I'm glad. It means a lot to me."

"Have you had it long?"

"Some years. I inherited it from the old owner..."

"I don't know what it used to be like, but I really like how it is now. The space is gorgeous. And I noticed the wheatpastes and prints on the wall. The studio that makes those is amazing."

"Oh, yeah. I commissioned the wall from them."

Their souls sparked a quiet light at that, shared love for visual art. They talked about the studio, praised the artists, shared which works they had in their own homes. The whole time, Lírio leaned forward, attentive, gently dissolving her nerves with his focused presence.

Mônica decided to test the waters, see how much she could find out.

"Do many other dead pass through here?"

Lírio paused to think, fingers brushing his lips, subtly guiding her eyes to them.

"One every few months, at most. People drifting through downtown, hunting, I guess. Like you."

"Actually... I was just looking for a show to watch. Wanted to enjoy some time alone."

That piqued his interest.

"Interesting. The ones that come by usually want easy prey. If they're not trouble, I let them do what they want and they're gone soon after. Weirdly, they never seem to return."

"Well... you know how we are. A paranoid bunch."

"Oh, yes. That you are." He got up, disappearing briefly into the dim house. "I'm guessing you don't drink beer?"

"No... not when I don't have to pretend."

Lírio returned, sipping from a green bottle, and this time sat beside her, on the same couch. Arms stretched across the backrest, utterly at ease. Entirely too warm.

She was so cold. And he radiated heat.

"Oh. I thought you were one of mine," Mônica said, peering at him more closely now that he was right there.

His brown eyes shimmered with golden flecks, even though the room held no yellow light.

"I'm not. Some say our people share a common past, but I don't know about all that."

Lírio went still again, letting her examine him. This time, Mônica noticed it, he wanted her to look. Wanted her to poke around and find his secrets. He was a puzzle box, practically inviting her to unlock him.

She nodded. The words that followed slipped out despite better judgment, pulled by his permission.

"I... I don't know anything about other kinds of people, except the dead. No one ever taught me what else is out there. Just how to live one night at a time. No adventures."

"I thought your kind had a tradition of passing that knowledge down."

"I'm still very young. And my creator is... He likes doing things at his own pace. No rush."

Lírio nodded, understanding. He seemed like the kind of person who understood everything.

"Well, you've got all the time in the world to figure things out, right?"

"Eternity. That's what they told me."

There was a bitterness to her voice. More than she meant to let slip.

"Sure," he said, leaning closer, a finger pointing as if saying I see you. "But just because you have eternity doesn't mean everything has to take an eternity."

Mônica would have blushed, if her blood still ran the way it used to.

"It's frustrating. Maddening," she confessed. Lírio nodded, so understanding, his face carrying the weight of her pain.

"I'm sorry."

Mônica sighed, air in, air out, all reflex. A body that still thought it was alive.

"There's nothing to be done. Just be patient. My whole life, to him, is just a phase. I know it's hard for him to consider my side."

"It's normal. The older ones forget how hard it is to be new. But... do you think you've lost something along the way? Between then and now?"

What kind of question was that? Something throbbed in her chest.

"Many things... Everything?" she whispered, voice trembling. A nervous smile broke across her face, mocking her own pain. "Feels like I've been dragging myself through useless nights, just waiting for him to be kind enough to let me live again."

Lírio moved closer and took her hand, so small, cold, and thin in his strong, long fingers. She saw dried paint on his nails, his wrist... and finally understood the calluses. An artist, like she had once been. In a different medium.

"Then let me make tonight worth it."

And suddenly, Lírio was even closer, touching her arm again. His hand slid up, caressing her neck, her chin. The monster inside Mônica opened its eyes once more, offering up its ferocity, but she shoved it down again, forcing it into silence with sheer will.

"You don't want this," she said, voice steady despite the hunger scratching at her insides. "It's dangerous."

"What if I told you I can handle myself?"

Lírio's fingers trailed to the nape of her neck, curling strands of her hair around them, winding. She shivered, eyes fluttering shut. When was the last time she'd been with someone like this? 1988? She wasn't about to let that be the last entry in her memory. He cradled her face, brought hers closer to his, his breath warm and searing in contrast to her chill. Mônica let herself be pulled in. His mouth brushed her cold cheek, and hers mirrored the gesture, grazing over his skin, feeling the roughness of a beard grown in a few days.

They met with hunger, but no desperation. A soft, slow kiss, tongues learning each other's shape. Lírio was much taller, and he leaned into her, arms enclosing her like a cage made of warmth. Mônica clung to him, seeking something solid, something that wouldn't vanish. She was so tired of not feeling safe anywhere.

She told herself she could pretend for an hour. Pretend things were different. She hitched her tight dress up her thighs and climbed onto his lap. Her arms wrapped around his neck, and she tilted her head, letting the kiss grow rougher. Her fangs brushed his lower lip, a warning. A reminder.

He laughed, breathless.

"Think carefully about what you want..."

"I'm not going to do that to you."

"Oh, no, see, I don't mind. But it might be... unsettling."

That amusement never left his voice. Was it because of some secret he wanted her to discover? Or because he was already celebrating, having seduced a monster into being his lover for the rest of the night?

Mônica stopped him from nosing at her neck. She held his face in her hands and made him look at her directly.

"Why unsettling?" Her voice came out serious, worn thin from half-truths.

But Lírio smiled like a riddle carved in stone.

"Want to learn something new tonight? Drink my blood."

The challenge struck her thirst like a match. Curiosity roared up with it, and so did the monster. Lírio opened his blazer, revealing bare skin beneath, warm, golden, lined with soft brown hairs. Mônica could feel every part of her come alive with anticipation.

She bent down, tugging him close by the brocade of his jacket. Ran her tongue across his skin, salty with sweat. Bit down into soft flesh, her fangs breaking through.

She hadn't believed in the supernatural until she first tasted blood. But the act of biting, it was always surreal. The blood rose on its own, pushed up by the heartbeat of the victim, flooding the mouth with impossible sensation. Every person tasted different beyond the iron tang, layers of texture, scent, and flavor bound to emotions, personality, even soul. Some elders said those sensations were the spirit being consumed, translated to the senses.

But this was more than sublime. It wasn't just like a perfectly cooked meal. It was like a drug trip. A trance. Hypnosis. Reality unraveled, body and mind pulled into a spiral of images, colors, smells.

And Lírio... Lírio was beyond everything she had ever tasted. His blood fizzed like champagne. Sweet, so sweet she could swear she heard birds singing, flutes in the distance, the gentle burble of a stream. She could feel sunrays breaking through trees and warming her skin, a feeling she hadn't known in decades.

She jerked back, stunned.

But that was just the beginning of the surprises.

Golden eyes watched her, eyes too bright, too alien. The face was still smiling, still familiar, but no longer human. The lines of the nose and mouth had changed, elongated like a muzzle. His hair now flowed long and curled. Two great horns spiralled from his skull, each one smooth and strong.

And not just him, the room had changed too. Now it was a deep, shadowy red, glowing with an orange-gold light that came from nowhere and everywhere. Something moved at the edge of her vision. A living glass sculpture, shaped like a snake, slithered across velvet cushions woven with golden thread. Its amber eyes locked on Mônica. A thin tongue slipped out, hissing.

Lírio's hands gripped her waist, steadying her, anchoring her in the middle of her fear.

"Is this how you see the world?" she managed to ask.

"It's not just how I see it. It's how my world is."

Mônica let her head fall back, eyes tracing the curve of embroidered curtains until they reached the ceiling. A chandelier had become a living angelic face, softly singing as it radiated light.

And for a moment, she forgot everything else.

"I... I want to see more."

Lírio smiled, kissed her chin, held her close.

"Don't worry. I'll show more after I fuck the surprise out of you."

Lírio's hands slid down her sides. He found the hem of her skirt again, bunched it in his fists, and tugged it higher over her hips. His palms roamed lower until they cupped her ass through the thin fabric of her underwear and the fishnets. The pressure of his fingers there made her shiver. There was no rush in the way he touched her, just curiosity, like he was still mapping her out with hands instead of eyes. She almost laughed, but it caught in her throat as he squeezed, slow and possessive. Her legs tightened around his waist, grounding herself on the shape of him beneath her. He pulled her soft flesh until her pussy lips parted.

Mônica moaned softly, licking his open wound, so the taste gave her a thrill.

He pulled her closer, spreading his knees slightly so she could settle against the line of his arousal, the same line where skin became dark brown fur. He rocked her gently over him, letting friction build while he kissed her throat, her collarbone, the edge of her jaw. Through the fabric, Mônica felt him grow rock hard, rubbing her entrance and her clitoris. The wetness of her undead body seemed to be just like it was when she was alive, runny and slippery enough.

She pulled the dress up and over, threw it back. His tanned hands squeezed her breasts, pinched the nipples as he pulled them out and over the edge of the cups. He was enjoying her body, and the show of her pale skin under the orange light, against black lingerie and red cushions. And Mônica got the vibe that he liked to fuck dangerous creatures.

Mônica circled her hips once more, slower this time, dragging the soaked fabric of her panties against the ridge of his cock. She felt him twitch beneath her, the fur coarse where it began to spread from his pelvis, warm and real and wrong in the most delicious way. Dancing on his lap, she used her panties to tease him further and further, until the satyr closed his golden eyes and let out a moan low in his throat, goat-like, barely human.

Her fingers slid between them, pulled the panties aside and tore a hole on the fishnets. The wicked sound made her tremble in delight. Lírio's breath caught. She guided him, slicking his head against her slit, teasing the pressure without allowing the breach.

He thrust up, gently, just enough to kiss her entrance, and her body opened around him like it had been starving. Mônica gasped as he filled her, thick and hot, stretching her in a way that made her chest ache and her undead nerves spark awake. She clutched at his shoulders, at the curve of his horns, riding the wave of pressure until she was seated fully in his lap, stuffed and still. His hands held her hips like he owned them.

She was so hot and so warm. Pleasure was pooling on her belly.

The dead woman rolled her hips again, and this time he met her halfway, the motion deeper, slicker. Her breasts bounced with the movement, still half-trapped in the black lace cups. Lírio kissed her again--this time rough, claiming, lips dragging open against hers. When he bit her lower lip, she almost bit back, but the hunger inside her was different now. She wanted to devour him through sex, through breath, through blood. She began to ride him harder, the wet slap of skin loud against the surreal quiet of that world. He grunted, tilting his head to bite her shoulder, just enough to mark but not enough to break skin. His claws dug into her ass, and she felt the weight of his strength holding her down, guiding her rhythm.

"You like this?" Lírio growled into her neck. "You like fucking a god?"

"I don't care what you are," she gasped, dragging her tongue over the shell of his ear. "As long as you don't stop."

He laughed, a wild, delighted sound, and shifted under her. He turned her body to the pillows, holding her down as his knees dug into the fabric, keeping her leg's wide open as he thrusted as deep as he could go, until his balls were pressed against her ass. Her moan cracked the air, long and breathless.

"Don't stop," she whispered again, and again. Mônica's head fell back, her fangs glinting in the glow. Her eyes rolled as her orgasm coiled and cracked through her like an electric shock.

A drop of his blood dripped between her lips, and she saw stars. Something magical was rising between them, pulling her mind away from the room and into the sky. A scream burst from her chest, not pain, not joy, but revelation. She was brought to see wild forests untouched by men, where nymphs and satyrs laid together under moonlight, devoured each other in love, in reverence of gods now forgotten.

Lírio's thrusts slowed, but they didn't stop. He moved inside her like he was stirring that power awake, coaxing it from her bones. The rhythm was deeper now, slower--ritualistic. Each movement sent her spiraling farther from herself. He gave her a bit more of his blood.

And she saw him for what he was. Not a man, not even a monster. He was old. He was the kind of old that existed before human tongues, names and creeds, before shame. The kind of old that walked the earth long before the first vampire ever woke to endless night.

He held her there, his body heavy, his breath damp against her collarbone. When she came again, it was quieter, but no less powerful. It wasn't a wave. It was a surrender. A surrender to something she couldn't name, something wild and warm that wrapped itself around her like roots finding stone. She clung to him, nails dragging down his back, trying to remember how to exist again inside her skin.

When he finally stilled by her side, Mônica lay tangled in him, in the cushions, in the scent of sweat and incense and old blood. Her skin, slick and tingling, felt too alive. Her limbs didn't want to move. Lírio stroked a hand down her back, slow and warm. She could've stayed there forever.

But forever wasn't hers to claim. The thought slipped in quiet, like a crack in the wall of a dream. It started small, just the image of her boots by the door. The memory of how tightly she'd laced them. Then the voice of her maker echoed again, dry and sharp in her skull: come back before dawn. Call me if anything feels wrong.

And this was everything he would've called wrong.

She stood, searching for her dress in the dim room, trying not to look at the serpent curled beside the wine-dark cushions. Her hands trembled as she pulled the fabric back over her skin. Her muscles ached, not from strain, but from fullness. From something cosmic and terrible settling inside her bones. Lírio watched her with a soft, knowing look, but didn't stop her.

He didn't try to hold her. But he did walk her to the door.

"When you're ready to see more," he said, brushing a strand of hair behind her ear, "just come back."

"Thank you. I will."

Mônica stepped into the stairwell. The party below had thinned. The night was winding down, and it was dangerously close to dawn, but she was in no hurry to be home.